Partner
Foundry Corporate News Amafond News

Over 30 years of experiences with Fomet pouring furnaces for grinding media production.

Reading time: min

FOMET SRL, one of the world leaders in induction furnaces and specialists in pouring furnace systems. It has had in operation, since 1970, two automatic tilting pouring furnaces type D2C with 4 tons capacity and 160 kW inductor for casting grinding balls at Christian Pfeiffer foundry in Mezzomerico (NO) , Italy.

 

Grinding balls

The foundry is situated in the province of Novara, Italy, close to Milano. Production began in 1968 as “Colombo Fonderie” then in 1984 became US steel company Armco Inc. In 1994 the name was changed to GST Europe SpA, when the Grinding System Division of Amco was sold to GS Technologies Corp. Since June 2000, GST Europa SpA became part of Christian Pfeiffer Maschinenfabrick GmbH- Beckum, Germany. CPM foundry is one of the largest manufacturers of high chromium grinding media in the world, and the largest producer in Italy, with over 80% of its production exported to cement plants and the mining industry around the world. Average production is 15,000 tons per year of grinding balls and cylpebs ranging from 15 mm to 120 mm. CMP grinding balls are exclusively cast out of high-alloy iron with a chromium content of 13% to 31%. The production operation in CPM foundry is reliable and economic which allow them to produce with the latest state of art high chromium alloys. Their high quality product has gained for the company international success. At CPM, the grinding ball materials are melted in line frequency coreless induction furnaces and metal is transferred by ladles to the FOMET holding pouring furnaces . The holding pouring furnaces are induction channel type with 4 tons capacity and 160 kW inductors incorporating FOMET’S unique air-cooled inductor system.

The molten metal is poured by automatically tilting the furnace in synchronization with a horizontal greensand indexing moulding line, with two moulds being filled at the same time. Moulding and pouring speeds range from 90 to 140 moulds per hour, depending on the ball size being produced. The FOMET technology and furnace design provides economies in the process and allows easy furnace maintenance resulting in production of the highest quality with the minimum effort and highest efficiency. The pouring furnaces are charged by ladles and the cast-iron is bottom poured through the internal pouring siphon into the mould with extreme dosing accuracy and precise pouring temperature.

 

The furnace is also equipped with an access door for easy inspection and removal of slag. Because of the FOMET design, it is possible to be refilling the furnace while pouring out metal into the mould. Thank to this design it requires only 70 kW for maintaining cast-iron with a full furnace at a temperature at 1, 400°C. This type of furnaces was developed to replace the earlier hand pouring of one, two or three in-gates per mould. FOMET tilting pouring furnaces are produced in a range from 1.5 t up to 8 t capacities and can be equipped with inductors of useful power ranging from 120 up to 500 kW, according to the superheating temperature requirements of the charge metal. Optionally the furnace can be equipped with “smart” automatic powder inoculation systems for correcting the metal composition in the metal stream during pouring. There is also a dynamic electronic weighing system, which provides continuous management data to measure the amount of metal in the furnace.  The furnaces are all equipped with oil-hydraulic “smart” tilting device to control the pouring flow with extreme accuracy, Tilting can be controlled manually by the operator, or in semi-automatic or automatic repeating mode. When required the furnace can be equipped with a moving carriage for positioning on X - Y axes to position the pouring spouts for centring over the mouldpouring cup. Several furnaces of this type are installed around the world for pouring on conventional greensand indexing moulding lines, carrousels, bath tub lines, radiator production, mechanical pieces, automotive parts, and engine cylinder liners. The tilting pouring furnaces are typically installed for mechanizing the pouring operation where a reliable, efficient, simple and trouble free system with very low maintenance service is required.

This solution also overcomes the lack of skilled personnel where precise pouring and maintenance operation are an issue. Tilting pouring furnace provide a reliable and less expensive alternative to the pressure pouring furnaces with stopper rod system for pouring medium to large casting weights on indexed greensand moulding lines of up to 200 mould per hour.

FOMET SRL will participate at the exhibition Mertallurgy-Litmash Mosca 2009 from the 12th until the 16th of May. 2009 held in Moscow, see us at booth 7-4 C04 at the exhibition.



Suppliers Profile:
<link _top>FOMET S.r.l.

 

[0]